Starting a new market garden or farm in the UK can be an exciting and rewarding venture. However, marketing your new business can be a challenge, especially in a competitive industry. To help you get started, here are 15 ways to market your new market garden or farm in the UK:
Create a website: A website is an essential tool for any business. Create a website that showcases your products, services, and mission statement. Ensure your website is optimised for search engines to improve your online visibility.
Develop a strong brand: Develop a brand that stands out from the competition. Consider hiring a designer to create a logo, business cards, and other marketing materials that are consistent with your brand. Or if your budget does not stretch to that, there are free online tools such as Canva.
Build a social media presence: Social media is an excellent way to connect with potential customers. Create profiles on popular social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram to promote your farm and engage with your audience. Engagement is key with social media, to post pictures and forget about them will be a huge time suck without many rewards. You must take the time to engage with any comments, comment on other similar content and be part of the community to reap the rewards.
Attend local farmers' markets: Farmers' markets are a great way to sell your products and build relationships with customers. Attend local farmers' markets to showcase your products and connect with potential customers, including local chefs, business owners and direct consumers.
Offer a subscription service: Consider offering a subscription service that delivers fresh produce directly to your customers' doorstep. This can help build loyalty and provide a steady source of income that is predictable.
Host on-site events: Host on-site events like farm tours, workshops, and cooking classes to promote your farm and engage with your community. Building a community around your small business is a powerful tool that can help in many ways.
Collaborate with local businesses: Collaborate with local businesses like restaurants, local shops and events to sell your products, run events, and reach a wider audience.
Participate in community events: Participate in community events like fairs, local groups, and festivals to showcase your products and connect with potential customers.
Offer a loyalty program: Reward loyal customers with discounts, special offers, or other perks to build brand loyalty.
Use email marketing: Use email marketing to stay in touch with your customers and promote your farm. Consider offering exclusive discounts or promotions to email subscribers.
Create informative content: Create informative content like blog posts, videos, and infographics that educate your audience about your farm, products, and industry. These will help keep the content on your website relevant and recent, this will help with SEO (Search Engine Optimisation); which will result in your website being listed higher on search engines such as Google.
Partner with like-minded businesses: Partner with like-minded businesses to help each other. You could organise events at each others venues, cross promote products, give free trials to other businesses customers or simply advertise in other peoples shops. Make sure the partnership works in both ways and you will have an ongoing cooperation that benefits both.
Use local SEO: Optimise your website for local search terms to improve your visibility in local search results.
Offer online ordering: Offer online ordering through your website or a third-party platform to make it easy for customers to purchase your products. We use our friends platform Ooooby.org
Attend trade shows and local networking: Attend trade shows and industry events to network with other farmers, learn about the latest industry trends, and showcase your products to a wider audience.
In conclusion, marketing a new market garden or farm in the UK requires creativity, persistence and showing up regularly. This time however can directly contribute to new customers and growing your business. Find what works for you, and focus on those activities.